Introduction: The Foundation Stone of Our National Existence, without Exaggeration

Part I. Stone

1. A Hieroglyph Designed by God

Part II. Tile

2. An Unmistakable Sign

3. You are Blind to the Meaning of the Dome of the Rock

4. Cataclysm and Pogrom: An Exergue on the Naming of Violence

Part III. Paper

5. Sir Alfred Mond’s After-Dinner Eloquence

6. Designs on Our Holy Places

Part IV. Celluloid

Conclusion: A Terrible Caricature

Notes

Bibliography

Index

“In Israel and the Occupied Territories, even the stones are invested with meaning, and ‘sacred’ architecture can take on a devastating political significance for both sides in the conflict.” — Columbia College Today

"[An] ambitious excavation of ‘the career of architecture’ in the prehistory of the Palestine conflict. . . ."— Gabriel Piterberg, New Left Review

"[H]old[s] an array of fascinating facts and historical tidbits. . . . Monk certainly provides an innovative paradigm to approach the modern tensions centering on the two holy sites in Jerusalem. . . An Aesthetic Occupation should be of interest to Palestinian scholars for its exemplary historical rigor and to those concerned with the cultural relationship between architecture and political violence." — Lynne Rogers, Al Jadid

"[T]he data gleaned from the archives is brilliantly subjected to a theoretical powerhouse combining postmodern insights into history, architecture, philosophy, postcolonial studies, and art critique. The result is an intellectual feast. . . . The main strength of Monk's essay [is] its rigorous commitment to presenting new data with theoretical sophistication. . . ." — Dan Rabinowitz, Journal of Palestine Studies

"Bertrand Monk takes an unorthodox look into the history of the 'sacred' architecture in the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis." — Middle East Journal

"The author unearths the history of the political immediacy of ‘sacred’ architecture in the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis, examining in particular the Mandate era. While examining the relation between monuments and mass violence in this context, he documents Palestinian, Zionist, and British attempts to advance competing arguments concerning architecture’s utility to politics." — Shofar

Reviews

“In Israel and the Occupied Territories, even the stones are invested with meaning, and ‘sacred’ architecture can take on a devastating political significance for both sides in the conflict.” —Columbia College Today

"[An] ambitious excavation of ‘the career of architecture’ in the prehistory of the Palestine conflict. . . ."—Gabriel Piterberg, New Left Review

"[H]old[s] an array of fascinating facts and historical tidbits. . . . Monk certainly provides an innovative paradigm to approach the modern tensions centering on the two holy sites in Jerusalem. . . An Aesthetic Occupation should be of interest to Palestinian scholars for its exemplary historical rigor and to those concerned with the cultural relationship between architecture and political violence." —Lynne Rogers, Al Jadid

"[T]he data gleaned from the archives is brilliantly subjected to a theoretical powerhouse combining postmodern insights into history, architecture, philosophy, postcolonial studies, and art critique. The result is an intellectual feast. . . . The main strength of Monk's essay [is] its rigorous commitment to presenting new data with theoretical sophistication. . . ." —Dan Rabinowitz, Journal of Palestine Studies

"Bertrand Monk takes an unorthodox look into the history of the 'sacred' architecture in the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis." —Middle East Journal

"The author unearths the history of the political immediacy of ‘sacred’ architecture in the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis, examining in particular the Mandate era. While examining the relation between monuments and mass violence in this context, he documents Palestinian, Zionist, and British attempts to advance competing arguments concerning architecture’s utility to politics." —Shofar

“A revelatory history of the architectural construction of the Israel/Palestine conflict that is also a stunningly original contribution to critical theory in the tradition of Adorno and Benjamin. Monk shows how both sides—thanks in part to the British—became trapped in a deadly quicksand of sacralized geographies and imagined histories.” — Mike Davis, author of, City of Quartz

Permission to Photocopy (coursepacks)

If you are requesting permission to photocopy material for classroom use, please contact the Copyright Clearance Center at copyright.com;

Permission to Reprint

If you are requesting permission to reprint DUP material (journal or book selection) in another book or in any other format, contact our Copyrights & Permissions Manager (use Contact Information listed below).

Images/Art

Many images/art used in material copyrighted by Duke University Press are controlled, not by the Press, but by the owner of the image. Please check the credit line adjacent to the illustration, as well as the front and back matter of the book for a list of credits. You must obtain permission directly from the owner of the image. Occasionally, Duke University Press controls the rights to maps or other drawings. Please direct permission requests for these images to permissions@dukeupress.edu.
For book covers to accompany reviews, please contact the publicity department.

Subsidiary Rights/Foreign Translations

If you're interested in a Duke University Press book for subsidiary rights/translations, please contact permissions@dukeupress.edu. Include the book title/author, rights sought, and estimated print run.

Disability Requests

Instructions for requesting an electronic text on behalf of a student with disabilities are available here.

Description

In An Aesthetic Occupation Daniel Bertrand Monk unearths the history of the unquestioned political immediacy of “sacred” architecture in the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. Monk combines groundbreaking archival research with theoretical insights to examine in particular the Mandate era—the period in the first half of the twentieth century when Britain held sovereignty over Palestine. While examining the relation between monuments and mass violence in this context, he documents Palestinian, Zionist, and British attempts to advance competing arguments concerning architecture’s utility to politics. Succumbing neither to the view that monuments are autonomous figures onto which political meaning has been projected, nor to the obverse claim that in Jerusalem shrines are immediate manifestations of the political, Monk traces the reciprocal history of both these positions as well as describes how opponents in the conflict debated and theorized their own participation in its self-representation. Analyzing controversies over the authenticity of holy sites, the restorations of the Dome of the Rock, and the discourse of accusation following the Buraq, or Wailing Wall, riots of 1929, Monk discloses for the first time that, as combatants looked to architecture and invoked the transparency of their own historical situation, they simultaneously advanced—and normalized—the conflict’s inability to account for itself.This balanced and unique study will appeal to anyone interested in Israel or Zionism, the Palestinians, the Middle East conflict, Jerusalem, or its monuments. Scholars of architecture, political theory, and religion, as well as cultural and critical studies will also be informed by its arguments.

About The Author(s)

Daniel Bertrand Monk is George T. and Myra W. Cooley Chair of Peace and Conflict Studies and Director, Peace and Conflict Studies Program [P-CON] at Colgate University.